What Is Team Reasoning?

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What Is Team Reasoning?

Here’s a preview. I will explain it later.

‘somebody team reasons if she works out the best possible feasible combination of actions for all the members of her team, then does her part in it.’

(Bacharach, 2006, p. 121)

Bacharach (2006, p. 121)

		Player X
		high	low
Player Y	high	2 2	0 0
	low	0 0	1 1

What should X do?

Game theory:

If X expects Y to choose high, X should choose high

If X expects Y to choose low, X should choose low

What X expects depends on what Y expects X to do ...

... -> X has no reason to prefer high over low.

Team reasoning:

...

hi-lo situations are pervasive in everyday life

(Bacharach, 2006, p. Chapter 1.1)

‘It seems quite obvious that you should choose [high].

However, the question is why it seems obvious,

and [...] why people almost always do choose [high].

(Bacharach, 2006, p. 35)

[...] The answer I shall offer has far-reaching implications for [...] our conception of ourselves as social beings.’

COmpare Sugden

‘it seems obvious that ‘high’ is the rational choice [...]. Apparently, something is missing from the standard theory of rational choice. But what?’

(Sugden, 2000, p. 182)

To repeat ...

‘somebody team reasons if she works out the best possible feasible combination of actions for all the members of her team, then does her part in it.’

(Bacharach, 2006, p. 121)

Bacharach (2006, p. 121)

We need some kind of identification

‘[A] team exists to the extent that its members take themselves to be members of it.

(Sugden, 2000)

[T]o take oneself to be a member of a team is to engage in such reasoning oneself, while holding certain beliefs about the use of such reasoning by others’

(Sugden, 2000)

Sugden (2000)

What counts as best possible?

‘In the standard theory, the individual appraises alternative actions by her in relation to some objective (her preferences), given her beliefs about the actions that other individuals will choose.

An individual who engages in team-directed reasoning appraises alternative arrays of actions by members of the team in relation to some objective (team-directed preferences).’

(Sugden, 2000)

Preferences of teams just like preferences of the individuals. (Team really is considered as an aggregate agent.)

‘At the level of the team, team preference is a ranking of outcomes which is revealed in the team's decisions.’

(Sugden, 2000)

		Player X
		high	low
Player Y	high	2 2	0 0
	low	0 0	1 1

What does team reasoning predict?

– depends on who is in a team

– depends on team-directed preferences
(which need not be a function of individual preferences)

– depends on how the situation is framed

You do not always team reason even with members of your team

[mention autonomy now but not aggregate agents yet!] It is important to recognise that we have autonomous aggregate subjects because ...

consequence: autonomy

‘There is ... nothing inherently inconsistent in the possibility that every member of the group has an individual preference for y over x (say, each prefers wine bars to pubs) while the group acts on an objective that ranks x above y.’

(Sugden, 2000)

Sugden (2000)

‘somebody team reasons if she works out the best possible feasible combination of actions for all the members of her team, then does her part in it.’

(Bacharach, 2006, p. 121)

Bacharach (2006, p. 121)

We need some kind of identification

‘[A] team exists to the extent that its members take themselves to be members of it.

(Sugden, 2000)

[T]o take oneself to be a member of a team is to engage in such reasoning oneself, while holding certain beliefs about the use of such reasoning by others’

(Sugden, 2000)

Sugden (2000)

I asked, What counts as best possible? Now we have answered that question (in best posible -> max expected utility relative to team preferences)

relevance to the ‘hi-lo’ questions?

q1 Why does hi seem obvious?

q2 Why do pepole almost always choose hi?

So how is this solved by team reasoning? (Later: if we agree with Sugden about ‘autonomy’, then maybe it isn’t.)

		Player X
		high	low
Player Y	high	2 2	0 0
	low	0 0	1 1

‘One of the salient features of [team] reasoning is that it generates recommendations for action that are not conditional on the actor's beliefs about what the other individuals will do.

‘In this respect, team-directed reasoning is quite different from the strategic reasoning that is modelled in conventional game theory.’

(Sugden, 2000, p. 191)